


Nowhere Else to Turn (Except Into Your Arms)

by flipflop_diva



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Spoilers, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Misunderstandings, Multi, Natasha Feels, Natasha Needs a Hug, Post-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Protective Steve Rogers, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Issues, Trapped, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-27
Updated: 2015-09-27
Packaged: 2018-04-23 09:46:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4872154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flipflop_diva/pseuds/flipflop_diva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony, Steve and Natasha don't have the perfect relationship, but what they do have works. Until the battle with Ultron leaves scars that can't be easily covered up and their entire relationship is put on the line. And now Steve is just worried it might never get back to normal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nowhere Else to Turn (Except Into Your Arms)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [navaan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/gifts).



> To navaan, thank you for all the awesome prompts you left! I've never written this particular threesome before, but your scenarios inspired me to try. I tried to incorporate as many of your likes as I could. I hope you enjoy!

“Tony, don’t do this.” Steve stared imploringly at the man he loved and shook his head in dismay.

“I have to do this,” Tony replied. He didn’t look at Steve.

“No, you don’t.”

“Pepper needs me.”

“Last time I checked, Pepper wasn’t your girlfriend anymore.” He tried to keep the bitterness out of his tone, but Tony turned his head finally.

“It’s business,” he said, and Steve could hear the edge underneath his words, the one that was Tony’s way of telling him to back off. “You know that’s important.”

“Of course I know that’s important,” Steve said quickly. “But that’s not why you’re leaving.”

Tony didn’t respond. He didn’t have to. They both knew the truth. The guilt had hung heavily over all of them since the moment Ultron was defeated and the consequences had all started to sink in. If Tony hadn’t created Ultron, if he hadn’t let Wanda get in his head, if Steve had just put _them_ first instead of the mission, if they had gone after her sooner …

So many what ifs. So many regrets.

“It’s not going to help her if you leave,” Steve whispered, as though she could hear them if he spoke it louder, even though they both knew she was nowhere within earshot.

Tony stuffed his hands in his pocket. “It’s not going to help her if I stay,” he said shortly. 

“Yes. It will,” Steve argued.

“Because it’s worked so well up to now?”

“You have to give her time.”

“She was _tortured_ because of me.”

“We don’t know that.”

“We do know that. Don’t pretend we don’t.” Tony started walking toward the car. “Just because she won’t say so doesn’t mean we don’t know.”

“Tony!” Steve’s voice stopped him right before he reached the vehicle. Tony turned, slowly. His eyes betrayed how hard this was for him.

“You will come back, right?” Steve felt like he could barely breath. He’d known it was bad on the Quinjet ride back to the Tower, that this was something that wasn’t going to be okay with hugs and kisses or even sex, but at least they had all been all together, at least there had been a flicker of hope that things could one day go back to normal.

“Yeah,” Tony said, but he didn’t sound very convincing. He slipped into the car then. No last kiss, no last embrace, not even one more reassuring nod. Just a puff of smoke from the tailpipe as he took off down the road, back to Manhattan and away from them.

•••

The bed felt too big and too empty without Tony in it. Steve couldn’t remember the last time the two of them had slept apart. It was the one thing they always had, no matter how much they fought during the day or drove each other crazy. At night, they always had the comfort of knowing the other one was there. 

Most of the time, Natasha was with them, too, but it was harder for her — to trust people enough to be entirely vulnerable with them every night, to fall asleep next to someone and not be on guard the whole time — but they knew she was doing as best she could, and neither Tony nor Steve ever said anything on the nights she didn’t join them.

She was here now, though. She’d slipped in just a few minutes after Steve had gone to bed, lying down practically on top of him. Steve suspected it was because she knew Tony had left, and she was hurt he hadn’t said goodbye to her.

They were both quiet as they lay there, but that wasn’t surprising. Natasha had been nearly silent for the past two weeks, ever since they had boarded the Quinjet home after taking down Ultron and even when they had all moved into the bunker in upstate New York. Her head was on his chest, though, and he could feel her warm puffs of breath on his bare skin. His hand trailed over her back and her arms, rubbing them gently. Her bruises from whatever Ultron had done to her had almost faded — he used to be able to see them at night through the thin cotton of her pajamas — but she still hadn’t let Steve do anything except kiss her, and she definitely hadn’t let them see her naked since, but he didn’t push her. Whatever had happened, he knew she needed to deal with it in her own timeframe, and he accepted that. He just wished Tony could be here now. He was always better at getting Natasha to talk.

“Steve,” she whispered, right around the time the sun was starting to creep up again. If she were anyone else, he would ask her why she was awake, but he knew she was barely sleeping since everything had gone down with Ultron.

“Yes?” he answered.

“Tony’s going to come back, right?” Her voice contained no hint of inflection at all. She spoke it like she was asking him if the sun would come out tomorrow, but he knew her better than that. She was scared, just like Steve was, that Tony wasn’t coming back.

“Of course he is,” Steve said.

“He left because of me.”

“No, he left because he has Stark Industries stuff to take care of.”

She was quiet for a few minutes, enough so that Steve was almost beginning to wonder if maybe she bought it, but then she tilted her head toward him and smiled at him, a very small, almost sad smile, but a smile all the same. “You’re still a horrible liar,” she whispered. He laughed softly and ran his fingers though her hair. He really was, but he wished he wasn’t. He would like to believe his own lies right about now if he could.

•••

Tony didn’t come back. Not the next day or the day after that or the week after that either. He called a few times, and he and Steve chatted, but Tony wouldn’t talk to Natasha, and if she tried to call him, she kept it to herself. 

But three weeks after Tony left, Steve got a text from him that he wanted them to come meet him at Avengers Tower so they could all talk. All three of them.

“Why doesn’t he just come here?” Sam asked when Steve told him. Steve shrugged. He had a bad feeling about this whole thing, but he didn’t want to say anything. Tony wouldn’t break up with them this way, would he?

“Maybe he just doesn’t want an audience,” Steve said.

“I don’t know, man,” Sam said. “Tony doesn’t seem to mind an audience for anything else.”

They left at dawn on Saturday morning, opting to drive instead of fly. Natasha was quiet the whole way there. So much so that it made Steve miss the days when she’d tease him the entire time about being ancient and then change the radio to the most obnoxious music she could find.

“Nat?” Steve said, just before turning into the private parking garage for the Tower. “Tony still loves us. _Both_ of us. You know that, right?”

She shrugged. “He hasn’t talked to me in five weeks.”

“Have you tried talking to him?” Steve asked gently.

Her eyes narrowed immediately. “Why would I do that?” She practically snapped. “Do you know what the last thing he said to me was?”

Steve shook his head. Tony had told him, the night after Ultron fell, that he’d tried to talk to Natasha but it hadn’t gone very well, but he hadn’t shared details and Steve hadn’t asked. He’d figured it was between them, and they would work it out. 

“He said if I had just listened to _you_ that Ultron wouldn’t have been able to grab me, and we could have stopped him sooner because no one would have been _distracted_.”

She said the last word as though it actually tasted bitter. Then she turned away from Steve, crossing her arms.

Steve stared at her. He knew Tony had been feeling guilty, even then, and he knew from experience that sometimes a guilt-ridden Tony deflected responsibility on to other people, but if he had even implied to Natasha that what had happened to her had been her fault …

“Maybe he didn’t mean it like it sounded,” Steve said. He wasn’t sure what else to say to her, not without talking to Tony first.

But Natasha just shook her head. “Maybe he meant it exactly like it sounded.” She opened the car door and got out. “Maybe he was right.”

She slammed the car door behind her and headed over to the elevators to the Tower. Steve followed after her, still at a loss for words.

•••

They found Tony waiting for them in the kitchen on the communal floor. He looked stiff and tense, and it made the uneasy feeling that had been in Steve’s chest since he got the text about a thousand times worse. They all stared at each other for a couple of minutes — Steve and Natasha on one side of the kitchen, and Tony on the other — as though they were preparing for a showdown and not a civilized conversation between three people who loved each other deeply.

“Well,” Tony finally said. “I’m here like you wanted. Let’s talk.”

“Like _we_ wanted?” Natasha said. She arched a brow. “You mean like _you_ wanted!”

“What?” Tony stared at her. “Did you hit your head in training? You guys sent a message _to me_.”

“No,” Natasha said. She glanced at Steve. The flicker of worry in her eyes matched the flicker of worry in his gut. “You sent it _to us_.”

“I most certainly did not! You sent it to _me_!”

“Are you high?” Natasha demanded. Apparently her worry was negated by Tony’s defensiveness. But then, it was always like that between the two of them.

“No, you crazy assassin,” Tony returned. “But I think you are.”

Natasha opened her mouth to respond, but Steve didn’t hear anything she said. Because he heard something far, far, far worse.

The sound a bomb makes seconds before it explodes.

“We have to leave!” he yelled. “It’s a trap!”

Natasha and Tony both stopped talking, their eyes widening almost in unison, but there wasn’t time to explain. There wasn’t time for anything.

Above them, probably on the roof, an ear-deafening explosion sounded, and the building around them began to shake. 

Steve heard Tony yell something, but he was desperately plotting their path. He could hear the sounds of wood and cement falling downward, and he knew if they stayed here, they were trapped.

But he also knew they would never make it to safety in time. 

So he did the only thing he could think to do. He lunged for Natasha, knocking her to the ground and positioning himself on top of her. He looked behind him, desperate.

“Tony!”

Steve saw something fly through the air, and for a second he thought it was the floor above them collapsing — for a second, he saw Tony falling down, down, down, without him. For a second he saw Tony vanishing forever — but then, with something almost akin to relief, he realized exactly what it was.

“Hold on to her!” Tony shouted.

Steve did as he was told, sliding his arms under Natasha, pulling her in so she was positioned against his chest. And then Tony, full Iron Man suit on, was leaning over Steve, wrapping his arms around him.

The noise above was getting louder, the sounds of everything falling, and then Steve felt it — the floor they were on giving way. He held on to Natasha as tightly as he could as Tony held on to him, and then they were falling.

Down.

Down.

Down.

Natasha screamed into his chest, but Steve just gritted his teeth and held on to her, trusting that Tony would keep them as safe as he could.

•••

They landed hard, but not as hard as they would have if Tony hadn’t used his boosters to slow them down. Steve’s whole body felt like he’d been slammed into a wall, but he didn’t dare move. He just stayed where he’d landed, waiting for what seemed like hours while debris and dust settled around them.

Finally, he felt Tony shift, and then the hands that had been wrapped around him disappeared as Tony rolled off them. Steve went next, carefully lowering Natasha to the ground before getting off of her.

He hadn’t felt her move since they landed — although he could feel, and hear, her breathing the whole time — so he wasn’t surprised to see her eyes were closed. He did, however, feel nauseous at the sight of the blood dripping down the left side of her head.

Tony moved faster than he did, fingering the wound gently. “It’s not deep,” he said. “She might have a concussion, though.” He started to shrug off his Iron Man gear. “We can use my shirt as a bandage.”

Steve nodded, finally lifting his eyes from Nat to look around. They were in some sort of pocket in the wreckage. How that had happened, Steve wasn’t sure, but it was big enough for them to be able to move a little, and there appeared to be a fair amount of oxygen, at least for the time being.

Tony stopped in his disrobing to follow Steve’s line of sight. “You thinking of trying to climb our way out?”

Steve shook his head. “Too risky,” he said. “We don’t know what each piece will dislodge.” He cast a glance back at Natasha. He and Tony might be able to survive something crashing down on them, but there wasn’t a good way to protect her. “Besides,” Steve added. “Sam knows where we went. This will be on the news, and he’ll see it. The new team will come. They’ll get us.”

“You sound confident.”

“I am.”

“And what if — who do you think it was? Hydra? — gets us first?”

“Well, then I guess we fight.”

“You have an answer for everything,” Tony said, but Steve saw he was smiling.

“Not everything,” Steve said. He looked pointedly from Tony to Natasha. “I don’t know how to fix us.”

“We don’t need fixing.”

“We don’t?”

Tony shrugged. “We just need a tune-up,” he said. He slipped the last of his Iron Man gear off, then reached for the t-shirt he had on, yanking it over his head. He handed it to Steve so he could rip it into a couple of long strips of cloth.

“Lift her up,” Steve said to Tony when he was done, “and I’ll wrap this around her head.”

Tony looked uncertain for a second, like he was suddenly realizing that despite what he’d just said, he hadn’t actually touched Natasha in weeks, but then he lurched forward, slid his arms under her back and lifted her just slightly so her head was off the ground.

Natasha moaned. Steve quickly wrapped the cloth around her head, tying it in a tight little knot so she couldn’t knock it off. He signaled to Tony that he could put her back down, but instead Tony shifted, sitting cross-legged on the floor and laying her gently across his lap. His fingers moved almost tenderly over her bandage.

Natasha moaned again, louder this time, more pain-filled. Steve sat down across from Tony and took her hand.

“Come on, Nat,” he said softly. “We’ve got you. You can wake up now.”

It took a little while, but finally, Natasha’s lashes fluttered. Both Tony and Steve stared down at her, watching for any sign of motion, until her eyes flew open. It took her less than a second to figure out where she was, and Steve watched the recognition settle into her green eyes.

“We’re not dead,” she croaked. She almost sounded slightly in awe, and like she needed a glass of water. Steve wished he had one to give her.

“Not this time,” Tony answered.

“How do you feel?” Steve asked her.

“Like I ran headfirst into a wall.”

Tony chuckled. “That sounds about right,” he said.

Steve squeezed the hand he was still holding. “Sorry about that,” he said. “We landed hard.”

“Not your fault, Steve.”

“I know,” he said. “But I wanted to protect you.”

It was the wrong thing to say. She yanked her hand out of Steve’s and pushed herself upward, wincing as she did. Her expression, though, had turned stony, despite the obvious pain.

“I don’t need protecting,” she practically hissed. 

Steve saw Tony shoot him a look, but he ignored it for now. Instead, he held his hands up, palms out, a gesture of surrender.

“That’s not how I meant it, Nat,” he said.

“Yes, it is,” she snapped. “You both think I’m a defenseless little girl who can’t take care of herself.”

“What?” Steve said. He shook his head, almost in bewilderment. “No one thinks that!”

But Natasha was pointing to Tony. “ _He_ does!”

“What?” Now Tony looked flabbergasted. “I definitely do not!”

“You told me if I had just listened and stayed out of the way, that things wouldn’t have gotten so bad!”

Tony gaped at her. “I did not say that … Okay, yes, I said _that_ , but I didn’t mean it … not like how you apparently think I meant it! And I sure as hell never called you a little girl, and I _definitely_ did not call you defenseless. I know you can kick my ass any day of the week!”

Natasha crossed her arms. She was glaring. “But yet, you both want to _protect_ me.”

“From rocks falling on your head!” Tony almost shouted. “Or are we just supposed to let you die so you can prove how badass you are?”

“Maybe you should.”

“What?” Tony had gone directly to actual yelling. “Are you crazy?”

Before he could say anything more, Steve clamped a hand over Tony’s mouth. Tony spluttered around it, but Steve didn’t care. He had seen something. A shift in Natasha at her last words, a tiny slump of shoulders, a twinge of regret in her voice.

This wasn’t about protecting her from the explosion.

“Natasha,” he whispered. He tried to keep his voice calm and gentle. “You want to tell us what’s going on?”

Natasha twisted around, turning her back on both of them. Her arms were still crossed, but Steve saw her fingers, and her shoulders, tense just so.

Tony glanced at Steve and then at Natasha’s back. Steve removed his hand so he could talk.

“Is this about what Ultron did to you?” Tony asked. He sounded completely calm now. “He hurt you, didn’t he?”

Natasha didn’t answer.

“We saw the bruises.” Tony kept going. “He beat you.”

“No,” Natasha said. Steve saw her fingers clench even more.

“You’re lying,” Tony said.

“I’m not.”

“Yes, you are. But what I don’t understand is why. Are you embarrassed that you needed us?”

“No.”

“Poor badass Natasha. Actually needing someone for once. The horror.”

“Stop it.”

“Stop what?” Tony asked. “Stop talking about the truth?”

“Please stop.”

“Because it’s totally okay if you help us and tell us when we’re messing up, but god forbid someone tries to correct or help little miss perfect you?”

“I said stop.”

“No,” Tony said. “I’m tired of stopping just because _you_ don’t want to talk about it. You’re supposed to be in this relationship, too, but all you do is keep secrets from us. How is that fair?”

“Please …”

“And now you don’t even have the nerve to look at us when we’re trying to talk to you.”

“I said stop!” Natasha spun back around to face them. Steve saw whatever Tony was going to say die on his lips as he stared at her. Steve couldn’t help staring at her, too. Natasha, their beautiful, stoic, almost always in control girlfriend, had tears dripping down her cheeks. And not just a tear or two that she could easily brush away. Natasha was full on crying, and Steve honestly felt like he’d been transported to an alien world.

Tony seemed just as stunned. He was still staring at her open-mouthed. “Oh, god. I’m sorry,” he finally managed. “I’m an asshole.”

Natasha shook her head. “No, you’re not.” Her voice hitched. “Everything you said it is true. It’s all my fault.” She dropped her head into her hands.

Tony glanced at Steve again. 

“Natasha.” Steve had an urge to reach out and hug her, but instead he forced himself to remain where he was. “What are you talking about?”

They waited until she had regained some control. She lifted her head. She looked slightly calmer, but tears were still dripping down her cheeks.

“You can tell us,” Steve told her.

She licked her lips. Then she reached up a hand and swiped at the tears. Finally, she wrapped her arms around her middle and turned her head to avoid looking at either of the men.

“It’s my fault,” she repeated. Her voice was surprisingly steady despite that fact that she was still crying. “Ultron wanted information. About both of you and the other Avengers. … I think he wanted to know more about all of us so he could find our weaknesses.” She paused, taking a shaky breath. “He told me if I told him what he wanted to know that he’d let me go. But …” She paused again, almost like she was steadying herself. “But if I didn’t do what he wanted, he said he’d kill you both and that the world would pay.”

She closed her eyes and pressed the palm of her hands to her eyelids. When she spoke, her voice was choked. “I didn’t tell him.” She let out a long, shuddering gasp. “And then people died … Pietro died … and it … it’s all my fault.”

She dropped her hands and opened her eyes. Tears were pouring down her cheeks again.

“It’s not your fault.” It was Tony who spoke, almost immediately.

Natasha shook her head. “Don’t say that.”

“No,” Tony said it. “ I mean it.” He leaned forward, grabbing one of her hands. She looked like she wanted to snatch it away, but she didn’t. Instead she just looked miserably at Tony.

“Tony’s right,” Steve said. Natasha glanced at him now. He continued. “Tell us why you didn’t tell Ultron what he wanted to know.”

She shook her head. “I can’t …”

“Yes, you can,” Steve said. “Tell us.”

“Because I knew he wouldn’t keep his word.”

“Exactly,” Tony said. “You did the right thing.”

“But people died …”

“People died because I fucked up,” Tony said. “That’s on me.”

“It’s not your fault,” Natasha told him. “You didn’t know what would happen.”

“I should have known,” Tony said. 

“And we should have come sooner,” Steve said. “When Ultron took you, we should have come sooner. Before he hurt you.”

“No,” Natasha said. She wiped at her eyes again. She didn’t seem to be crying anymore, though. “You had to save the world. That’s more important than me.”

“But see, that’s the thing,” Steve argued. “You _are_ our world.” He glanced up at Tony. “You both are my world. Without you two, I don’t want to be here.”

For a second, neither one of them moved. And then Natasha rolled her eyes, those beautiful green eyes, her lips curving up into a smile. “That’s the sappiest thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” she said, and he could hear the lift in her voice.

“You and me both,” Tony told her, and Steve could hear the teasing in his too. 

“Well,” Steve said. He shrugged, then grinned. “But that’s why you love me.”

This time Tony was the one to roll his eyes. “I guess,” he said, in an exaggerated tone.

Natasha laughed. “I don’t think that’s why,” she said, but she leaned over to grab Steve’s hand. He bent down to press his lips against hers.

“It’s okay,” he said after he’d pulled back. “I know you two love me as much as I love you.”

He thought at least one of them would make another joke, but neither one did. Instead Natasha moved so she was sitting against Steve, leaning into him. Tony followed suit, sitting against her and leaning into her. 

“I really am sorry,” Tony said after awhile. Steve knew he was talking to Natasha. “I never should have said it was your fault. It wasn’t your fault. You didn’t do anything wrong. I was just so scared … If Ultron had killed you, if we hadn’t gotten you back … I was so scared … I thought if we’d just kept you from going out that day that maybe …. I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too,” Natasha said. She sounded tired.

“Me too,” Steve said. “For everything.”

They drifted back into silence. Steve wasn’t sure if everything had been settled, but despite the fact that they still didn’t know when rescue was coming, it was the most relaxed he had felt in weeks.

•••

It took fourteen minutes less than twenty-four hours. All three of them were starving, dehydrated and exhausted. But when the debris above them parted and Sam’s face peeked through, all three of them grinned up at him.

“I feel like I’m disturbing something,” Sam said, and Steve couldn’t help but laugh. The three of them were curled together, Natasha in the middle, arms and legs all entwined, hands holding the others. Steve was pretty sure Tony had been kissing her when Sam had appeared.

Natasha turned her head from Tony to look at Sam. “Get us out of here,” she said, “and you can disturb something much better later tonight.” Steve had a feeling she followed that up with a wink.

Sam made a face. “How about I get you out of there, and you never mention anything like that again?”

“That’s not fun,” Natasha said.

“Don’t listen to her,” Tony said. “She has a concussion. Please get us out of here.”

“Give us ten minutes,” Sam said. His head disappeared from the space above, but Steve could hear him mumble “Only you three” under his breath as he went to get the others.

Steve looked to his left, at the two people who meant more to him than anything in the world. They had come so close to losing each other, but they were all here, they were alive and they were together. Even dirty and hurting and tired, he felt like he was the luckiest man alive.

And when they finally got back to the bunker, he was going to make sure they both knew exactly how lucky he felt.


End file.
